Marine Geology 357 (2014) 182–194 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Marine Geology journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/margeo Late Pliocene variations of the Mediterranean outflow Nabil Khélifi a,b,⁎,1, Michael Sarnthein a, Martin Frank b, Nils Andersen c, Dieter Garbe-Schönberg a a Institute of Geosciences, Kiel University, Germany b GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel, Germany c Leibniz-Laboratory for Radiometric Dating & Stable Isotope Research, Kiel University, Germany article info abstract Article history: Late Pliocene changes in the advection of Mediterranean Outflow Water (MOW) derivates were reconstructed Received 8 June 2013 at northeast Atlantic DSDP/ODP sites 548 and 982 and compared to records of WMDW at West Mediterranean Received in revised form 10 June 2014 Site 978. Neodymium isotope (εNd)valuesmorepositivethan−10.5/−11 reflect diluted MOW derivates Accepted 23 July 2014 that spread almost continuously into the northeast Atlantic from 3.7 to 2.55 Ma, reaching Rockall Plateau Site Available online 8 August 2014 982 from 3.63 to 2.75 Ma. From 3.4 to 3.3 Ma average MOW temperature and salinity increased by 2°–4°C and ~1 psu both at proximal Site 548 and distal Site 982. The rise implies a rise in flow strength, coeval with Keywords: Pliocene a long-term rise in both west Mediterranean Sea surface salinity by almost 2 psu and average bottom water Onset of major Northern Hemisphere salinity (BWS) by ~1 psu, despite inherent uncertainties in BWS estimates. The changes were linked with major Glaciation Mediterranean aridification and a drop in African monsoon humidity. In contrast to model expectations, the rise Mediterranean Sea in MOW salt discharge after 3.4 Ma did not translate into improved ventilation of North Atlantic Deep Water, Mediterranean Outflow Water since it possibly was too small to significantly influence Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation. Right after fi North African aridi cation ~2.95 Ma, with the onset of major Northern Hemisphere Glaciation, long-term average bottom Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation water temperature (BWT) and BWS at Site 548 dropped abruptly by ~5 °C and ~1–2 psu, in contrast to more Intermediate waters distal Site 982, where BWT and BWS continued to oscillate at estimates of ~2 °C and 1.5–2.5 psu higher than today until ~2.6 Ma. We relate the small-scale changes both to a reduced MOW flow and to enhanced dilution by warm waters of a strengthened North Atlantic Current temporarily replacing MOW derivates at Rockall Plateau. © 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction Mauritzen, 2001). Increasing salinity anomalies at the depth level of MOW in the Rockall Trough are linked with temporary contraction of Derivates of Mediterranean Outflow Water (MOW) constitute a the subpolar gyre and thus suggest a direct advective, albeit temporally tongue of warm and highly saline, moreover, nutrient-depleted and variable, pathway (Lozier and Stewart, 2008). 18 highly oxygenated waters in the northeast Atlantic at 300–1400 m On the basis of Nd isotopes (εNd) and paired benthic δ OandMg/Ca water depth (w.d.), that derive from deep and intermediate waters records our study aims to reconstruct the development of temperatures, downwelled in the Mediterranean Sea and advected through the Strait salinities and densities, water mass transport and reach of lower MOW of Gibraltar (Reid, 1979; Zenk and Armi, 1990). Because of local topog- derivates in the context of global changes from the warm mid-Pliocene raphy and mixing processes in the Gulf of Cadiz (Borenäs et al., 2002) climate to the Pleistocene onset of major Northern Hemisphere MOW splits into an upper (300–800 m depth, 13.5 °C, 36.5 psu) and Glaciation (NHG), 3.7–2.55 Ma. The records have been obtained from lower limb (1100–1400 m depth, 11 °C, 37–38 psu). Due to Coriolis sediments of Deep Sea Drilling Project (DSDP) Site 548 off Brittany forcing most of the lower limb flows north forming a boundary current (1250 m w.d.) and Ocean Drilling Program (ODP) Site 982 on Rockall of meandering mesoscale eddies along the continental slope of Iberia Plateau (1135 m w.d.) at the northeast Atlantic continental margin (Käse and Zenk, 1996). Having passed the Bay of Biscay these waters (Fig. 1). Horizontal and vertical anomalies of the proxies between the reach up to Rockall Plateau (O'Neill-Baringer and Price, 1997), where two sites help us to constrain past shifts in the spreading and mixing they mix with North Atlantic Current (NAC) waters (McCartney and of MOW. We surmise that vertical displacements of MOW mainly reflected changes in MOW density since the mid-Pliocene, provided that the aperture of Gibraltar had been largely constant since the end of the Messinian ~5.3 Ma (Blanc, 2002). ⁎ Corresponding author at: GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel, Changes in the initial state of MOW are monitored at ODP Site 978 Germany. Tel.: +49 431 600 2310; fax: +49 431 600 2925. E-mail addresses: nkhelifi@geomar.de, nabil.khelifi@springer.com (N. Khélifi). in the Alboran Sea (1930 m w.d.; Fig. 1). Today, this site is bathed in 1 Present address: Earth Sciences and Geography Editorial, Springer, Heidelberg, Western Mediterranean Deep Water (WMDW) which contributes Germany. Tel.: +49 6221 487 8573; fax: + 49 6221 487 68573. ~33% of the MOW flux of ~0.7 Sverdrups (Tsimplis and Bryden, 2000; http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.margeo.2014.07.006 0025-3227/© 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. N. Khélifi et al. / Marine Geology 357 (2014) 182–194 183 NSOW perspective with records previously measured and now updated at sites 548 and 978. A 2. Tracers of MOW derivates in the present and past 982 Northeast Atlantic LSW NAC 548 2.1. Neodymium isotopes Nd has an oceanic residence time of ~400–2000 years, slightly ntic shorter than the global ocean mixing time (Arsouze et al., 2008; North Atla Rempfer et al., 2011). The dissolved Nd isotope composition of nean MOW Mediterra modern seawater in the Atlantic is controlled by weathering inputs Sea of continental rocks of different ages and compositions, mixed and Image courtesy: Martin Jakobsson 978 B advected by water masses leading to εNd values between −7and A B −26 (cf. Frank, 2002) and thus serves as quasi-conservative tracer 0 NAC of water mass mixing and circulation (Supplementary text #1). For 36.5 MOW Salinity (psu) the unradiogenic Nd isotope signature of LSW (εNd ~ −14) the input 982 548 2 36 mainly stems from weathering of Precambrian rocks in Greenland and LSW Canada and is dominated by the marginal exchange of downwelled 35.5 waters with ice rafted, fluvial, shelf, and Eolian sediments (Lacan and Depth (km) 4 Jeandel, 2005). 35 In contrast, modern MOW leaves Mediterranean Site 978 with an ε − − 60°N 50°N 40°N 30°N Nd signature of 9.4 to 9.1 (Fig. 2b; Tachikawa et al., 2004). Farther downstream, εNd signatures of MOW derivates become increasingly less fl Fig. 1. Locations of Deep Sea Drilling Project (DSDP) Site 548 (48°54′N, 12°09′W, 1250 m radiogenic along its ow path through mixing with NACW and LSW. w.d.), Ocean Drilling Program (ODP) Site 982 (57°31′N, 15°52′W, 1135 m w.d.), and ODP Combined evidence from various archives suggests that εNd values Site 978 (36°13′N, 2°3′W; 1930 m w.d.). (A–B) shows a modern salinity transect along change from −9.4 off southern Portugal (Stumpf et al., 2010)to−9.8 the northeastern North Atlantic margin based on data of NODC (2001) and plotted further west (Muiños et al., 2008), −11.1 to −11.2 in the Bay of Biscay using Ocean Data View (Schlitzer, 2013). NAC = North Atlantic (surface) Current. (Rickli et al., 2009; Copard et al., 2011), and −10.5 at Site 548 west of MOW = highly saline tongue of Mediterranean Sea Water (in green) centered near fi ε − 1000 m w.d. (Reid, 1979). (For interpretation of the references to color in this figure Brittany (Khéli et al., 2009). Finally, Nd drops to 11.3 at Rockall legend, the reader is referred to the web version of this article.) Plateau Site 982 at 1135 m w.d. (this study) as compared to −12 to −13 characteristic of LSW below (Spivack and Wasserburg, 1988) and −13 of NAC above Site 982 (Lacan and Jeandel, 2004). Here, shal- low intermediate waters on Rockall Plateau may even be less radiogenic García-Lafuente et al., 2007). About 67% of MOW is entrained from with values as low as −14 (deep-sea coral εNd data of Colin et al. (2010), Mediterranean Intermediate Water (Millot, 1999). In the past, the Copard et al. (2010),andRobinson et al. (2014)). Thus, the εNd differ- composition of these two water masses may have varied in parallel, ence between MOW and ambient Atlantic waters is sufficient to resolve since all Mediterranean sites of deep-water convection are controlled changes in the past admixture of MOW in the Pliocene sediment records by largely similar climate forcings. Site 978 also has monitored long- of sites 548 and 982. However, we note that Iceland–Scotland Overflow term Pliocene changes in sea surface temperature, salinity, and climate, Waters at N1300 m depth near Rockall Plateau and volcanic-ash- that finally have controlled changes of MOW density and flow strength. contaminated sediments around Iceland also show seawater εNd values In the Strait of Gibraltar MOW is flowing west beneath an eastward of −9.7 to −10.3, similar to those of MOW derivates (Crocket et al., flow of warm Atlantic surface waters (~15 °C, ~36.2 psu), a derivate 2011; Elmore et al., 2011; Khélifi and Frank, 2014).